Capitalism 2 and Capitalism Lab Forum

I do like the sound of this

colonel_truman wrote: ↑Fri Jun 19, 2020 10:40 am
Yes, but in the CES you are playing to develop the cities and you end up caring about them, so you want the people to prosper. Adding a wealthy class (whatever that might be) where you can see it grow will give us that.
Sounds good. Let's discuss the possibilities and assess the feasibility together.

However we always need the workers to be cheap, otherwise it pushes up the price of the product. And would push up Pensions ect but that is another post entirely.
We also have to look at the reality's in true life. Companies are always looking at either getting more out of a worker for more money but not employing more or replacing them with robots/AI.
I will create a new post regarding 4G industry as I think it will tie in with this post. Farming is a good example, as the technology increases, it's demand on workers become less, so yes you may pay more, but you have less workers to pay, so the vast don't prosper, the few do. Again Caplab doesn't cater for technology and less workers you require. Many car industry sims do cater for this as your always after more production and less workers due to wages and pensions ect. Gear City replicates this well. You have a problem later on, where the Pension just get's out of hand and you look at trying to produce more cars with less workers for that reason.

David wrote: Fri Jun 19, 2020 1:13 pm Sounds good. Let's discuss the possibilities and assess the feasibility together.

Could you be more specific?

colonel_truman wrote: Sun Jun 21, 2020 2:27 pm

David wrote: Fri Jun 19, 2020 1:13 pm Sounds good. Let's discuss the possibilities and assess the feasibility together.

Could you be more specific?

Hi colonel_truman, please see below text highlighted in blue for what I suggested we could do at the moment as part of the feasibility study.

(The following post was the one I wrote replying to baz earlier on this thread).
This is a good suggestion. I think we just have to think about what kind of effect it would exert to the gameplay.

Take Tropico 6 for example, different income groups are simulated. Do you think that has a real impact on the gameplay?

In CapLab, the Real Wage Rate you see below the mini-map tells the overall wealth level of the citizens, which is a simplification and does not take into account of wealth inequality. But in my opinion, the advantage of this design is that the player doesn't have to deal with too much detail and just have to make decisions related to labor costs and purchasing power of citizens based on one variable -- the Real Wage Rate.

On the other hand, if we can dissect the gameplay effects of having different income groups in games like Tropico 6 and reach a conclusion that they do have meaningful gameplay impacts, then we may take the next step and try to come up with a suggestion on how to augment this aspect of gameplay in CapLab by simulating different income groups.

David wrote: Mon Jun 22, 2020 9:44 am if we can dissect the gameplay effects of having different income groups in games like Tropico 6 and reach a conclusion that they do have meaningful gameplay impacts, then we may take the next step and try to come up with a suggestion on how to augment this aspect of gameplay in CapLab by simulating different income groups.

Hello!
I don´t know anything about Tropico6, so I cannot offer an opinion there.

If you want to reflect in-game a wealthy class my guess is that first you will have to make possible at least two different sets of population (I would consider age groups too, but that´s another story), and second define the paths that segments of the population will have to walk to get there. Then third, what possible alterations that shift will cause.

Assuming you deal with the first, we come to the second. Speaking of what, I have seen some oddities about how the game represents certain "macro" stuff. I´ll mention some:
-People spend between 80% and 85% of their income. I know that much, but I don´t know if that factor is reflected in the consumer products market.
-The GDP components are fixed (the consumption component varies between 80 and 85% of the total, the rest follow suit);
-City tax pools are fixed (income tax hovers about 50% of the total tax pool, the rest follow suit).
I have also observed that GDP doesn´t reflect with rigour corporate sales, but moves independently. Nevermind the size of the corporate sector.

Talking about simplifying the game so as not to overburden our fragile minds, I find these unacceptable shortcuts (speaking as a player), because if one wants to just focus on manufacturing and retailing one doesn´t need to have the CES turned on.
When we choose to play the CES, we expect to deal with these matters (the "macro" stuff alluded) in a way where there´s the possibility to change them through our decisions with meaningful, observable consequences.

There are other things that are reflected in the game but simplified to the extent that there´s no real meaning in them, and are vital, like money supply/demand for example. They shouldn´t be simplified. They should be there affecting the economy. I doubt people will complain if you give them the tools to change the "macro stuff" (for good or bad) and see the consequences of their interventions.

After that my guess is that implementing the wealthy class would come, one could say, like an afterthought, like many other things from that point on.

Always glad to help.

See Post on Income and Wealth Distribution: https://www.capitalism2.com/forum/viewt ... =49&t=7723

Wealth and Income could be factored into the game in the following ways:
*Types and Quality of Goods and Service Markets: Luxury High Price Low Volume (High Income/Wealth), Quality/Brand Medium Price Medium Volume (Middle Income/Wealth), Cheap/Budget Low Price High Volume (Low Income/Wealth)
*Savings and Investing Markets: Higher Income Individuals would allocate a larger portion of their income for savings and investments and the Highest Income Individuals would allocate savings to invest in more active/risky investment assets.